Talk:LendingClub

Infobox updates
Hey, Wikipedia! I'm an employee at LendingClub here operating on the company's behalf. In lieu of making direct edits, which I know is forbidden, I will make suggestions on this Talk page and let editors who have no conflict of interest decide if they're thorough and well-sourced enough to add to the LC Wikipedia page.

My first edit request is pretty straightforward. I wanted to update a few items in the page's infobox, including:


 * Sourcing the Founded and Key People fields with this Financial Times piece.
 * Changing the Industry listed from Personal finance and software to: Financial services
 * Changing the Products field to Services as this is more encompassing of what LendingClub offers
 * Adding Fintech under Services

I see that User:Ptrnext recently updated the financial figures, which I've had my eye on for a little while. Thanks for taking care of that! If User:Ptrnext or any other editor is interested in helping out with these edits, please go right ahead. Cheers! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 16:55, 31 May 2022 (UTC)


 * ✅ Ptrnext (talk) 01:44, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Pictogram voting wait.svg Already done Closing per 's comment Happy Editing-- IAm  Chaos  04:21, 1 June 2022 (UTC)
 * Hello, Ptrnext and IAmChaos! I'm popping in here to say thanks for looking over and approving my edit request. I'm planning to propose future edits to the body of the article, so look out for those, if they interest you at all. Until then! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 15:31, 9 June 2022 (UTC)

Updated History section draft
Hey again! While inspecting the page, I noticed that the History section, while it contains many solid facts, has some awkward phrasing in it and doesn't contain much information about what LendingClub has done over the past few years, as it has rather dramatically altered how it operates. I researched and drafted a new History that brings the section up to date, while keeping nearly everything in the existing section intact. Since the draft is quite long, I uploaded it to my user page. Here I'll quickly run down the more substantial changes and additions I made:


 * Fixed a handful of tense and grammatical issues, and standardized the way that the section presents dates and financial figures
 * Added some details to the Scandal and struggle subsection on U.S. government agency investigations into the company, and how those incidents were resolved
 * Changed the Car loans and mortgages subsection heading to Product extensions, as that's a more accurate characterization of what it contains
 * Added details to that subsection about a partnership between LC and Opportunity Fund, plus a brief summary of what Lending Club Open Integration is and how it works
 * Significantly expanded the final subsection, renaming it From peer-to-peer to marketplace banking and covering LC's launch of its Scale program, its acquisition of Radius Bank, and the closure and later relaunch of its secondary trading platform

I would like to invite editors—specifically User:Ptrnext and User:IAmChaos, both of whom reviewed my initial edit request—to take a close look at my draft and either post it to the LendingClub page or let me know what I could do to improve it. Thank you in advance to whoever takes the time to comb through what I've written. Cheers! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 19:55, 6 July 2022 (UTC)


 * Hi there, User:UnitedStatesian! I saw that you recently made a few small updates to the LC article, and wanted to say that I appreciate your interest in improving the page. Would you also be interested in reviewing my History request above? It's been sitting for about a month and I haven't had much luck finding independent editors to take a look at it.
 * Just to be totally clear: I have a COI, so that's why I'm asking for your help as opposed to making the proposed edits myself. Thanks! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 15:25, 8 August 2022 (UTC)
 * Hey, User:Quetstar! I noticed that you recently made an edit to this article, so I thought I'd ask if you would be interested in looking over the History request I've made above. As you can likely tell from the timestamp, I've been searching for an independent editor to review this request for a while now, with no success. I would really appreciate your help, if you can find the time. Thanks! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 20:58, 25 August 2022 (UTC)
 * I'm closing this because the user who made this request has been banned. Bowler the Carmine |  talk  10:34, 22 November 2022 (UTC)

Merger proposal
Formal request has been received to merge: LendingClub Bank into LendingClub; dated: September 2022. Proposer's Rationale: ''Just to be clear: I'm a LendingClub employee with a COI, which is why I'm making this request. Radius Bank used to be its own entity, which I think is why this article still exists, but after it was bought by LendingClub in 2021, it was completely absorbed by the company. There is no such thing as "LendingClub Bank," just banking services offered by LendingClub. Here are Bloomberg and SF Biz Times articles with further info. ''. Discuss here. GenQuest "scribble" 15:33, 15 September 2022 (UTC)
 * Merge (and rename LendingClub Bank --> Radius Bancorp) - Based on the sources, Radius Bancorp would be the proper title of the Wikipedia page since there was no name change, just its services absorbed. Looks like LendingClub bought it just for the charter. --CNMall41 (talk) 05:38, 10 October 2022 (UTC)
 * Just asking for clarification: The request was to merge LendingClub Bank into LendingClub; in that scenario, there would be no separate Wikipedia page LendingClub Bank to be renamed. Are you suggesting the rename as a second-choice alternative to the merger, are you suggesting renaming the LendingClub page itself or something else entirely? Felix QW (talk) 17:22, 21 October 2022 (UTC)
 * , sorry for the confusion. The current page for LendingClub Bank was originally Radius Bank. When LendingClub purchased Radius Bank, the page name was changed to LendingClub Bank. That was inaccurate to do as the bank name does not appear to have changed. LendingClub simply absorbed Radius Bank and Radius Bank then no longer existed. So that bank is defunct. My suggestion is to change the page name for LendingClub Bank to Radius Bank, then redirect the name LendingClub Bank to LendingClub. Hope that clears up the muddy water. --CNMall41 (talk) 06:29, 24 October 2022 (UTC)

Implementing the merger
I now merged the content from LendingClub Bank into here. EFlynn, could you possibly post a working link to the Bloomberg article? Also, it seems to me that the banking services information may be misleading and outdated, since all references are from around 2017 and presumably the take-over by LendingClub had an impact on the business model and the way the bank is run. So newer information/sourcing would probably be very welcome. I may not actually work on this though, since I just came here patrolling Proposed article mergers and don't actually have any experience or special interest in finance or business articles. Felix QW (talk) 08:29, 24 October 2022 (UTC)


 * Thank you for moving the merge request forward,User:Felix QW! Here's a |working link for the Bloomberg article. Sorry the formatting got messed up on that.
 * There is quite a lot of outdated information in the new Banking services section. So much that I think it should be scrapped entirely. To clear up any confusion: Radius and LendingClub don't have much to do with each other. Radius was operating as its own entity with its own services, and then once LendingClub bought Radius, Radius ceased to exist and LendingClub began to use some of Radius's assets (mainly its banking charter) for its own purposes. So, for example, the sentence that reads "LendingClub formerly had one physical banking branch located in Boston when it was operating as Radius Bank" isn't true. That was Radius, back before LendingClub entered the picture. The same is true of almost everything in the current Banking services section. Does that make sense? I know I'm getting into the weeds here.
 * A few months ago, I drafted a new History section for the LendingClub page, which includes some details about the acquisition of Radius by LC. You can view that edit request using this link, and the full section draft is on my user page. I also just uploaded a Business model draft that explains how LendingClub used to operate, when they were more focused on peer-to-peer lending, and how they operate now, after the Radius acquisition. That draft is on my user page as well. Here's a link.
 * My idea was to have these drafts replace the existing sections, but I'll defer to independent editors as to what works best. I understand that article mergers are a fraught process, so I hope these drafts help clarify some of the details. User:Felix QW, would you be open to reviewing the Business model and/or History' drafts? Or if not, maybe User:CNMall41 or User:GenQuest have some interest? Thank you to everybody involved with this, for taking the time. I'm here if anybody has further thoughts or questions. EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 14:16, 28 October 2022 (UTC)
 * I would rather allow it to go through the normal edit request process. Cheers. --CNMall41 (talk) 06:17, 1 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the suggestion, User:CNMall41! I can definitely open this up to the standard edit request process. Before I do that, I just want to make sure that User:Felix QW and User:GenQuest don't object, or have other ideas about what should be done going forward. If nobody replies in the next few days, I'll make a new post, with an edit request template attached, summarizing where the page is at post-merger and what might need to be reviewed by independent editors. Talk soon! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 21:36, 4 November 2022 (UTC)

Addressing post-merger issues
Hello! On the recommendation of User:CNMall41 above, I've decided to open up discussions about how to iron out the page's post-merger issues with an edit request. Here I'll briefly recap the situation, for anyone who's looking at this with fresh eyes:

I had previously suggested that the (now-defunct) LendingClub Bank page be merged with the LendingClub page. After some discussion among editors, User:Felix QW helpfully deleted the LC Bank page and migrated some of its content onto the LendingClub page. Which is a great start, but there are now some inaccuracies and redundancies on the LendingClub page. I detailed some of these in my post above.

I have drafted new History and Business model sections. The former has information about LendingClub's acquisition of Radius, the bank that would become "LC Bank". And the latter contains info about how LendingClub's operations and services have changed since the company acquired a bank charter.

I'm aware this might be a lot, for an editor who hasn't been keeping up with these developments. I'm happy to clarify further. Just ask away. I'm a LendingClub employee with a COI, so my role in this process is to make suggestions and provide context. I know that independent editors should ultimately decide how to resolve these post-merger issues. Thanks! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 18:00, 14 November 2022 (UTC)


 * I would be happy to scrap the current two sections on the previous and current business model and replace them with the Business model draft, as it seems like quite a bit of cruft has accumulated there over time, and the section taken from Radius is hopelessly outdated. However, I would like to see other opinions before doing so, since according to the template instructions, such a rewrite should find clear consensus before being implemented. Felix QW (talk) 19:13, 14 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Hey User:Felix QW, I agree that it would be a good idea to gather more opinions. I'm open to any ideas you have for building consensus. For my part, I'll tag in User:GenQuest, since they helped with the merger. I'm also going to travel to the WikiProject Computing Talk page. It's possible someone there will be interested in reviewing. If I can do anything else to facilitate discussion on this, please let me know. Thanks! EFlynn at LendingClub (talk) 22:43, 21 November 2022 (UTC)
 * We can't possibly use text drafted by an employee of this company, and you should not be proposing this. As an admin, I'd note that this article has had long running spam problems, including by editors with an apparent conflict of interest with this company. Nick-D (talk) 08:52, 22 November 2022 (UTC)
 * I've just blocked 'EFlynn at LendingClub' for spamming. Nick-D (talk) 09:08, 22 November 2022 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: Denied per Nick-D. Quetstar (talk) 19:22, 9 December 2022 (UTC)